skippy the bush kangaroo

Sunday, October 31, 2004

wisconsin could be the key to a kerry victorygreenbay, wisconsin, that is.

since 1936, the outcome of the washington redskins' last home game before the election has correctly predicted the outcome. if the 'skins win at home, the incumbent party keeps the white house. if they lose, the opposing party wins the election. the asspress lays it out in a time line for political/sports/trivia buffs.

as of this writing, greebay is beating washington, 20-7. but it's still the third quarter, and anything could happen.

all the polls showing a tied race are among lv's. as 2000 and many other elections have made clear, the truth lies somewhere between lv and rv polls. i always believe that kerry is doing around one point better than lv polls show, since he regularly does better among rv's than lv's.

the incumbent rule. as we are seeing, there will not be many undecideds for kerry to clean up between the final polls and when most people enter the booth, but in a tight race, it will be enough to put kerry over the top.

gotv and early voting. early voting from florida, iowa and nevada looks pretty good. nationally, it looks very good, as kerry is either tied or only down four in states that bush won by eight points in 2000 (he also won early voting in 2000 by double-digits). also, our wave of volunteers and staff for our gotv effort are of a scale not witnessed in recent decades, and i truly believe that it will add 1-2% to kerry's final national total.

newsweek started its third night of polling after osama bin laden, the mastermind of the sept. 11 attacks, appeared in a videotape warning americans that another terrorist strike on the u.s. is possible.

but john zogby, on the other hand, has kerry ahead by one:

kerry received 47 percent support and bush 46 percent backing in a nationwide survey by reuters/zogby with four days to go before the nov. 2 election. three percent were undecided in the oct. 27-29 tracking poll of 1,209 likely voters, which had a margin of error of 2.9 percentage points. bush and kerry were tied at 47 percent each in an oct. 26-28 zogby survey.

we luckily, had errands to run yesterday, so we were out and incommunicado from the screeching heads before, during and after the osama bin laden tape broke.

when we got back we rushed to the internets (all of them) to see what bin laden had said.

scanning the stories, we saw that essentially, osama bin laden said nothing of import.

then we surf through some of the blogs. and it was like john kerry had just been in a plane ride with paul wellstone. People were depressed, and worried that this was going to tip the election over to awol.

thanks to bensdad dkos diary, we find this san diego union piece about a repubbb who tried to steal a dem sign, got caught (in a very elaborate trap), then tried to lie his way out of it by saying the dem was trying to "rape" him. however, it didn't work:

[pete nolan] pieced together a homemade security system, installing a motion-activated alarm and floodlight and a video camera near the 5-foot-tall nylon [kerry/edwards] sign...

a man triggered the alarm and light tuesday just before midnight as he ripped the sign, which is highly visible to traffic on encinitas boulevard, from the wall, according to an incident report filed with the sheriff's department...

as neighbors called the sheriff's department, nolan said, he chased the man, caught up to him near vulcan and encinitas boulevard, grabbed his arm, then tackled him and "sat on him until the police got there."

the suspect, whom the sheriff's report identified as jessie irvin mathews, 22, of vista, initially told deputies that nolan had "jumped him and tried to rape him" for no apparent reason, nolan said.

one problem with that: mathews was caught on camera pulling the banner off the garage and starting to run away with it, according to the incident report.

after viewing the tape, deputies transported mathews to their encinitas station and cited him for attempted petty theft.

nolan, 40, said he "had a pretty good feeling" he would catch someone in the act and was overjoyed that his homemade security system did its job.

new in blogtopia*we thought you might like tocheck out ad nausea, a site dedicated to contacting the advertisers of sean hannity to let them know how we feel about his specific brand of vitrol disguised as punditry. as it says on the home page:

does it bother you that part of every dollar you spend at many companies ends up paying for sean hannity to insult, demean and mock your sincerity, intelligence and patriotism?

ad nausea is a grassroots effort to educate corporations that it just isn't good business to insult half of their potential customers. with limited funds to devote to marketing, it makes more sense for companies to advertise on programs that don't thrive on belittling their customers.

advertisers need to know that supporting people who trade in distortions, slurs and ad hominem attacks is going to drive potential customers away.

that is where you come in. we are here to provide the contact information to advertisers and sample letters to assist you in letting companies know that they can spend their advertising dollars more wisely. the rest is up to you! if you feel so inclined, please help our effort by contacting these advertisers directly.

the kids at the daily cookie send us this electionwatchdog.org report that tells us gov. ah-nold has taken $4.7 from special interests to campaign against to a cal proposition limiting environmental laws;

Friday, October 29, 2004

plus, they asked mtv not to air eminem's mosh video, toothe asspress is reporting that the white house tried to put pressure on al jazeera television not to air the latest osama bin laden tape:

the state department on friday asked the government of qatar to discourage al-jazeera from broadcasting a videotaped speech by osama bin laden, a senior state department official said.

the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the state department spoke to officials in qatar before al-jazeera showed a portion of the tape. in it, the al-qaida leader said the united states can avoid another attack if it stops threatening the security of muslims.

the request to the persian gulf government, which is considered an ally in the u.s. campaign to counter terror, was passed through the u.s. embassy in doha, qatar's capital.

al-jazeera spokesman jihad ali ballout issued a statement saying his station "has established itself as maintaining an independent editorial policy" and based decisions on what to air on newsworthiness. "i don't think anybody would disagree as to the high news value of the bin laden tape," he said.

of course, the biggest disappointment of all is that bin laden refused to endorse either candidate.

if john f. kennedy died, it would go a little something like this...vaughn meader, the impressionist who probably begat two generations of bad political comedy, died today at the age of 68.

meader rose to stardom with his impression of jfk in the 60's, and in fact created a series of comedy albums known as "the first family" which ushered in the whole concept of popular topical satire without salient points (ie, just for laughs, and what's wrong with that?). the asspress:

when it came out in late 1962, poking gentle fun at jfk's wealth, large family and "vigah," "the first family" became the fastest-selling record of its time, racking up 7.5 million copies and winning the grammy for album of the year.

compared with today's bare-knuckled political humor, the satire was tame, but it tickled the funnybone of the kennedy-obsessed public.

meader's meteoric rise and fall in gerald nachman's book "seriously funny: the rebel comedians of the 1950s and 1960s." "one twist to the single-bullet theory that didn't make it into the warren report: the same bullet that killed jfk also murdered vaughn meader's career," nachman wrote.

we at skippy international believe that every political impressionist, from john byner to dan ackroyd to jim morris to dana carvey to norm macdonald to bill hammond to will ferrell to that new squirrely guy on snl, and everybody who ever did an impersonation of a famous politician to make a fast buck at the toronto "ho ho's" or whatever hole in the wall dive they played at, owe vaughn meader a debt of gratitude.

and if we were them, we'd take a moment of silence tonight to remember the guy who started it all.

premature confettilationthanks to bill in portland maine's dkos diary (and, we admit, we stole his joke for the title), we found this great pic of awol looking pretty grumpy because the celebratory confetti that was to be shot off at the end of his speech in new hampshire.

as with all yahoo stories, be sure to go rate this one highly, so it stays on the front page!

score one for the good guysjerome armstrong, over at mydd, does a fine job analyzing how the repubbbs got their come-uppance when they tried to challenge thousands of newly-registered democratic voters.

it seems the ohio gop sent the new voters registered mail, and when the voters refused to sign for it (as many did), the mail was returned. it was based upon that returned mail that the repubbbs filed challenges, on the premise that those new voters obviously didn't "live" at those addresses, because they didn't accept the mail.

well, the summit county board of elections not only threw out all these bogus challenges, they also intimated that the repubbbs who signed the false challenges could be brought up on felonly charges.

the summit county board of elections abruptly threw out 976 challenges of voter eligibility by the republican party today after barbara miller, the challenger, revealed that she did not have any personal information about the eligibility of any of the challenged voters.

instead, miller said that her challenges were based on a list of "undeliverable mail" given to her by the republican party. the list was based on a gop mailing sent to registered voters throughout the state of ohio.

after miller presented this as her evidence, russell pry, summit county election board member, told her that she could be indicted for signing a sworn challenge without any personal knowledge about the eligibility of the voters. miller's reaction was to plead the fifth amendment.

jerome has the transcripts of the hearing. it's wonderful to see a real world example of the old saw: cheaters never prosper!

more repubs for kerrydkos points out that former gop senator bob smith (who, kos reports, "even left the republican party at one point because he considered it too moderate. in fact, he was one of those guys who waved around plastic fetuses whenever abortion was debated") has endorsed john kerry. in a letter sent to kerry, former sen. smith writes:

as someone who worked with you daily for 12 years as a united states senator, i am acutely conscious of the fact that we disagree on many important issues. despite our differences, you have always been willing to engage in constructive debate in an effort to forge sound public policy.

i deeply respect your commitment to our nation and your patriotism which, i believe, was forged when you-like i-proudly wore the uniform of the united states navy in viet nam...

because of the courage and character you demonstrated in vietnam, i believe you when you say that you'll do a better job than president bush to win the peace in iraq, as well as to win the war against terrorism.

president bush has failed to restrain federal spending, sending our deficit spinning into the stratosphere. i well remember that you were one of a handful of democrats who crossed the aisle to forge a bipartisan coalition in the senate to balance the federal budget…

john, for each of these reasons i believe president bush has failed our country and my party. accordingly, i want you to know that when i go into the booth next tuesday i am going to cast my vote for you. so will my wife, mary jo, and all three of my children: jason, bobby and jenny.

and u.s. newswire lists even more repubs and some independents who are backing kerry.

(we personally like the little girl dressed as nancy reagan by a flag-draped coffin, though the littlest abu ghraib prisoner is kind of cute, too. but then, our sense of humor has always been perverse.)

freep yahoo!please go to this asspress story and rate it high (down at the bottom of the piece) to ensure it appears on the yahoo front news page:

bad news dogs bush as election nearsthe presidency comes with powerful tools that can help incumbents keep their jobs: a mighty public-relations machine, a bully pulpit, a famous airplane. yet president bush has been powerless to halt a recent tide of bad news, from surging violence and missing weapons in iraq, to missteps by his own campaign, to a potentially damaging new probe by the fbi.

in a friday speech, kerry hoped to stoke the latest revelation: news that the fbi has begun investigating whether the pentagon improperly awarded no-bid military contracts to halliburton co., formerly headed by vice president dick cheney.

his running mate, john edwards, said, "the special treatment of halliburton is wrong."

for four straight days, bush had been dogged by a report that nearly 400 tons of explosives disappeared from iraq's al-qaqaa military installation.

bush aides winced when former new york city mayor rudy giuliani, a frequent bush campaign partner and surrogate, said the troops in iraq, not bush, bore the responsibility for searching for the explosives…

there was more: the u.n. nuclear agency said u.s. officials were warned about the vulnerability of explosives stored at the installation after another facility was looted.

minneapolis abc affiliate kstp-tv, which had a crew embedded with the 101st airborne division during the war, released videotape that it said showed soldiers examining explosives at the massive al-qaqaa facility nine days after the fall of baghdad. the video could possibly undermine bush's suggestion the explosives were looted before the u.s.-led invasion of iraq.

happy black friday anniversary from the bush economic teamyes, it was seventy five years ago the world witnessed the great market crash (no, not that market crash). so it is only fitting that the economic news keeps looking bad for awol on this day.

the economy grew much less last quarter (a whole point less) than everyone expected. cnnmoney:

the economy grew at an annual rate of 3.7 percent in the third quarter, the government reported friday, up from the prior quarter but well below forecasts on wall street.

growth in gross domestic product (gdp), the broadest and perhaps best indicator of the nation's economic health, accelerated from the 3.3 percent rate in the second quarter, the commerce department said. but the reading fell short of economists' average forecast of 4.3 percent for the quarter.

not that there's anything wrong with thatfunctional ambivalent thinks that repubbb (and senile) senator jim bunning is trying to imply his dem opponent is gay:

kicking off a five-day bus tour, (bunning's) campaign provoked a new controversy monday when the republican state senate president, david williams, accompanying him used “limp wrist” and “switch hitter” at two stops to describe mongiardo, who is single.

“jim bunning is fully capable of still throwing that hard pitch from the mound, and his opponent is a switch-hitter who doesn’t know whether he’s on left or right,” williams said at one stop. at another, he told bunning supporters, “we don’t want to change a hard right for a limp wrist.”

what does dick cheney's daughter mary, who is a lesbian, think about that?

the number of americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits rose 20,000 last week, the government said on thursday in a report that continued to be somewhat inflated by hurricane-related claims.

"the claims report shows that we are still not growing jobs like we should, given the (economic) recovery that we are in," said brian taylor of manufacturers and traders bank in buffalo, new york.

the rise in claims was larger than wall street economists' expectations for a rise to 338,000 from the prior week's original measure of 329,000.

stepping into deep qaqaaour buddy holden at first draft directs us over to rising hegemon, who tells us about video taken by reporters embedded with us soldiers as they broke into the bunkers at al qaaqaa. the reporters, from kstp in minneapolis, subsequently said:

using gps technology and talking with members of the 101st airborne 5 eyewitness news determined our crew embedded with them may have been on the southern edge of the al qaqaa installation, where that ammunition disappeared. our crew was based just south of al qaqaa. on april 18, 2003 they drove two or three miles north into what is believed to be that area.

during that trip, members of the 101st airborne division showed the 5 eyewitness news crew bunker after bunker of material labelled explosives. usually it took just the snap of a bolt cutter to get in and see the material identified by the 101st as detonation cords.

"we can stick it in those and make some good bombs." a soldier told our crew.

there were what appeared to be fuses for bombs. they also found bags of material men from the 101st couldn't identify, but box after box was clearly marked "explosive."

in one bunker, there were boxes marked with the name "al qaqaa", the munitions plant where tons of explosives allegedly went missing.

once the doors to the bunkers were opened, they weren't secured. they were left open when the 5 eyewitness news crew and the military went back to their base.

"we weren't quite sure what were looking at, but we saw so much of it and it didn't appear that this was being secured in any way," said photojournalist joe caffrey. "it was several miles away from where military people were staying in their tents".

Wednesday, October 27, 2004

massachusettes liberals deal busch devastating blow in the heartlandin what we can only hope to be indicative of next week, the bosox slaughtered the st. louie cards in the world series, putting them away tonight handily, three to zip.

breaking the curse of the bambino and an 86 year dry spell, the boston red sox trounced the competition in four games of the world series.

further embarrasing the cards, the sox knocked shut them out in their own home, busch (the beer guys, not the evil empire guys) stadium.

everyone at skippy international was rooting for the sox, because they haven't had it for so long. the fact that this team from boston, mass, won a week before the election was only icing on the cake.

let this be a warning, awol...great things come out of massachusettes!

the nader of the campaignup for victory has more evidence of gop support for ol' ralphie boy.

and if you want to let ralphie boy know what you think he should do in the states in which he's campaigned (no, not that!), why not send him an email via the people's email network? (thanks to reader dc for the link!)

holy evildoers, batman!holden, over at first draft, directs our attention to this reuters article that reports how awol has won probably the most significant accolade in his entire career: best movie villain of the year.

president george w. bush may see himself as defender of democracy and compassionate conservatism but film fans have voted him "movie villain of the year"…

in a poll for total film magazine, the u.s. leader fought off competition from such well-known baddies as atomic scientist doctor octopus from "spider-man 2" and fellow texan leatherface from "the texas chainsaw massacre".

"the overwhelming response of our readers voting bush top villain just goes to show how frightening people found him in fahrenheit 9/11," total film's editor matt mueller told reuters.

"he was absolutely terrifying in that film. the infamous scene where he's informed about the twin towers attack while visiting a school, and sits there absolutely paralysed, is enough to strike fear into anyone's heart," he said.

rummy and the morning zoojudd legum of winning argument discusses the bizarre radio interview donald rumsfeld had recently (even more bizarre than howard stern calling up michael powell).:

us defense secretary donald rumsfeld has suggested the controversy over missing iraqi explosives will probably amount to no more than a tempest in a teapot and compared it to other oversold stories that circulated during the war.

"do you remember when the museum - everyone said the museum was looted?" mr. rumsfeld said when asked to comment on the disappearance of 380 tons of conventional high explosives from al-qaqaa military base south of baghdad.

[snip]but mr rumsfeld, in an interview with a cincinnati, ohio, radio station said that the whole story reminded him of reports about heavy looting at the iraqi national museum after the beginning of the war, which later proved to be exaggerated because many of the national treasures had been hidden before the war by museum curators.

[snip]

he made clear he believed the explosives could still be located because us troops had been finding them hidden in hospitals, in schools, "all across that country, buried in some instances."

in a great majority of polling places, of course, voting will be very efficient -- even fun. poll workers will guide you through the process. they're non-partisan, and they are there to help.

but it's likely that some precincts will be targeted for vote suppression, and that's what we have to be on the look-out for. since one key suppression tactic is slowing down the voting process, we have to be careful not to fall into that trap. don't obstruct: just demand that whoever is giving you trouble step aside with you and let the voting continue.but before we get into what you should do if things go wrong, here are a few pointers to help make sure your voting experience is a good one:

find your polling place ahead of time.

having this information ahead of time will help make sure that you can zip to the polls and back during that half-hour lunch break. you can locate your local polling place using your zip code at my polling place.

in most cases, the site will tell you what kind of voting machines to expect and how they work. (by the way, if mypollingplace.com conflicts with information you've received from your county or state election officials, use the official information.)

when in doubt, ask. poll workers are there to help you. they'll show you how to work the machines, and if you're at the wrong polling place, they should tell you how to get to the right one. every polling place should also have a posted list of your voting rights, and instructions for filing a complaint if your rights have been violated.

know your rights.

if you're an eligible voter, you have the following rights:

if your name is not on the official voter list but you believe you are eligible to vote in that precinct, even if an election official challenges your vote, you have the right to cast a "provisional ballot."

if you're in line when the polls close, you should stay in line because you're entitled to vote.in many states, your employer must allow you time to vote at some point during the day.you can't be fired for being late due to long polling lines.

bring photo id, preferably government-issued id or a utility bill, phone bill, or paycheck with your name and current street address. if you're a new registrant, it may be required.

vote in the morning. in a great majority of polling places, everything will go smoothly, but by going early you can help prevent lines later in the day.

a regular ballot is better than a provisional ballot. if your eligibility to vote is questioned, ask if you can cast a regular ballot by providing additional id or by going to another polling place. only cast a provisional ballot if there's no alternative available.

so, what if something does go wrong?

first, document it. if there are specific individuals involved who are challenging your right to vote, intimidating voters, or interfering with the process, try to get theirnames. write down exactly what happened, including the time of day, descriptions of the people involved, and any other details you can remember.

then, report it. there are lots of organizations that will be working to respond quickly to complaints of voter intimidation, suppression, and fraud. here's who to call:

moveon pac: go to moveon. on election day, our website will host a form where you can post your problem and get help.

common cause: call 1-866-myvote1. common cause has set up a hotline that you can call to report any problems you have voting. they'll document where problems are occuring, watch for wide-spread voter suppression, and provide real-time legal help to the hot spots.

1-866-our-vote. this hotline has been set up by a coalition of nonpartisan groups to deal with the most serious problems on election day. they have hundreds of lawyers standing by to immediately respond to the most egregious problems. 1-866-our-vote is the "911" of voter suppression hotlines. please don't call unless your problem is serious enough that you have to talk to a lawyer immediately.

again, to download a wallet-sized card with all of this information that you can bring with you to the polls, go here.

we'll take blogtopia for a hundred, alexour friend bob harris tells us that bill "don't let the darkies vote" rhenquist is probably not long for this world...

turns out rehnquist probably has the anaplastic form of thyroid cancer (indicated by the tracheotomy) which is pretty much a death sentence. he'd be about 80% likely to be dead by this time next year if he was our age. which he ain't. so this election is suddenly now very all supreme courty more than before...

and, while we're at it, we need to point out that apparently the jeopardy reruns on which bob appeared as a contestant are now on the game show network. bob harris and alex trebek? talk about a daily double!

who's worse? blogger or cbs/nyt?our apologies to everybody, but blogger was having troubles today, and we had an unfortunate time trying to post anything. and it's too bad, too, because according to jerome armstrong at mydd, the nytimes and cbs are "suppressing" their latest florida poll, because kerry was leading by as much as 9 points:

here's a email note i got from an insider pollster:

the word i hear is that nyt/cbs are not going to release their latest fl survey, because it shows kerry up by 4 points. apparently, they [cbs & nyt's] think that is an implausible result, so they are suppressing it. of course, it's not implausible at all. and imagine the reverse: would they have suppressed a poll showing bush up 4?

update (chris): the rumor i heard, from a good source, was that the poll showed kerry up nine in florida. maybe the poll is flawed, but they should at least release it. include whatever caveats they want. after all, flawed polls never stop gallup or mason-dixon from public release.

whether or not they are "suppressing" it, or merely going back into the field to confirm it, we believe they should release the numbers.

awol's bulge conspiracy revealed: bad tailorcbsnews is reporting that awol says his "bulge" in the back of his suit during the debates, which caused widespread rumors on the internets that he wore a radio receiver to get the answers, was nothing more than bad clothing:

"please explain to me how it works so maybe if i were ever to debate again i could figure it out," mr. bush said tuesday on abc's "good morning america."

[ed. note: we doubt it]

when asked about the bulge that appeared as he and sen. john kerry debated sept. 30 in coral gables, fla., mr. bush tantalized conspiracy theorists by saying, "well, you know, karen hughes and dan bartlett had rigged up a sound system ... "

"i guess the assumption was that if i were straying off course they would ... kind of like a hunting dog, they would punch a buzzer and i would jerk back into place," mr. bush said. "that's just absurd."

using the word "jerk" in a sentence about awol? that's not so absurd.

this news totally ruins the office pool here at skippy international, which had the leading explanation for the bulge being "awol's poorly conceived idea of the proper use of a codpiece."

head of iraq blames head of americatalk about gratitude! only weeks after enjoying awol's hospitality in washington, iraqi prime minister allawi ragged on the us for such a little thing as allowing the slaughter of 49 iraqi police earlier this week. the uktimes online:

iraq's interim prime minister yesterday delivered another blow to president bush just a week before the us election when he blamed american-led forces for failing to prevent last weekend’s massacre of 49 iraqi army recruits.

mr allawi, who only last month lavished praise on mr bush during a white house visit, said that “gross negligence” on the part of the us and its coalition partners was to blame for the massacre of the recruits, 95 miles north of baghdad.

mr kerry had already moved onto the attack against mr bush over monday’s news that hundreds of tons of explosives were stolen from an iraqi military facility after the us-led invasion, and reports yesterday of an imminent white house request for another $70 billion for iraq and afghanistan.

adding to the bad news from iraq, an iraqi insurgent group said it had kidnapped 11 iraqi national guardsmen, while masked gunmen warned in a videotape that iraqi civilians and military targets would be attacked across the country if us-led forces attacked the rebel stronghold of fallujah...

mr allawi’s comments could not have come at a worse time for mr bush. the massacre of the recruits “was the outcome of gross negligence by some parts of the multinational (forces),” he said in his weekly address to iraq’s interim national assembly.

happy feast of demetrius the martyr from the bush economic teamconsumer confidence fell for the third straight month, says reuters:

u.s. consumers turned more gloomy in october, beset by soaring energy prices, relentless violence in iraq and the increasingly bitter end of the presidential election campaign.

the conference board's gauge of consumer confidence fell to 92.8 in october, the lowest level in seven months, from 96.7 the prior month, the private business group said on tuesday. the reading was below economists' expectations for a dip to 94.0.

the main index was dragged down mainly by consumer expectations, which tumbled to 92.0 from 97.7. the current conditions index slipped to 94.2 from 95.3.
"consumers are more concerned about the future than they are about current conditions and i think that has a lot to do with the high oil prices we're seeing and probably some of the election rhetoric," said gary thayer, chief economist at a.g. edwards & sons in st. louis.

cnnmoney tells us it ain't good news for awol:

the decline is a potentially troubling sign for president bush who's in a tight race against sen. john kerry. since the 1968 election, a conference board index reading below 100 generally indicates a loss for the incumbent's party.

consumer confidence is also important for the economy, since consumer spending fuels two-thirds of gross domestic product, the broadest measure of u.s. economic output.

the rasmussen consumer index fell a point on tuesday to 116.3. the index, which measures the economic confidence of american consumers on a daily basis, is down one from a week ago, down one from a month ago and down five points from three months ago.

the rasmussen investor index dropped two-and-a-half points on tuesday to 134.1. the investor index is down one from a week ago, down two from a month ago, and down ten points from three months ago.

thirty-six percent (36%) of american adults say their own personal finances are getting better while 43% say they are getting worse. those numbers are similar to those from a month ago when 36% said better and 41% worse.

vote early and oftena new film, votergate, is premiering on the net today. they tell us:

three exciting young filmmakers, simon ardizzone, russell michaels androbert carrillo cohen, have produced "votergate" the timely criticalfeature film that uncovers the truth about new electronic voting systemswhich allow a few powerful corporations to count our votes in secret!every american who cares about democracy must see this film before theelection! these filmmakers decided to create a 30 minute "specialedition" of their feature film as a free public service to get thisinformation out to the public - in time for the presidential electionand it premiers october 26, 2004 online at (www.votergate.tv).

critics of these e-voting systems protest that the machines are nottransparent to the voters and provide no paper ballot/receipt or any wayto do a meaningful recount. but votergate is not just a warning, thefilm strongly concludes that elections are harder to defraud when votersturn out in big numbers. just as public interest and news about theseelection issues are exploding, the votergate special edition is themust-see film that educates citizens about how to keenly observe,question and protect the process on election day!...

george wendt, the actor famous for his role as the good friend "norm" onthe hit comedy cheers, narrates "the special edition." featured: bevharris, the executive director of black box voting(www.blackboxvoting.org), the seattle grandmother who uncovered thesecret software that counts american votes. according to vanity fairmagazine, her investigations are breaking news, "that would have madeher career at the new york times or washington post." andy stephenson,associate director of black box voting is uncovering nationwideevidence of security risks in america's voting system.

also featured: congressman robert wexler (http://www.wexler.house.gov/ florida's 19th district, who is leading the effort to comprehensivelyreform our electoral system following the 2000 election controversy inflorida. he also has an active lawsuit to require paper ballots in allflorida counties. congresswoman corrine brown(http://www.house.gov/corrinebrown/) of florida's 3rd district, whoformally invited the organization for security and cooperation in europe(esce), and the organization of american states (oas) to participate inthe upcoming united states presidential elections as monitors.

awol needs a gate (to close on his way out)mordecai of change for a america thinks that awol needs a "gate" scandal to tip his tenure over the edge. he talks about it here. and he also has a poll asking what the missing exposives in iraq scandal should be called.

if only newspaper endorsements were electoral voteseditor & publisher reports that not only has kerry beat awol in the number of newspaper endorsements, he has stolen many editorial votes that went to awol in 2000:

sen. john kerry continued his raid on newspapers that backed president bush in 2000, grabbing 24 new "flip-flops," plus the washington post, which was a major supporter of the war in iraq. the democrat has now won endorsements from at least 35 papers that went for bush in 2000, while bush has earned only two gore papers.

however, bush got a prize in the key state of ohio, the columbus dispatch.

kerry now leads bush 125-96 in endorsements in e&p's exclusive tally, and he leads by about 16 million to 10 million in the circulation of backing papers.

and more setbacks for bush: the detroit news, which has never endorsed a democrat, and which backed bush in 2000, announced that it would sit out the 2004 election, not happy with either candidate. the times-picayune in new orleans, another bush backer in 2000, said the same thing today in an editorial titled "no one to champion." a third bush supporter in 2000, the patriot-news in harrisburg, pa., also declared neutrality today.

i represented george bush sr. as a delegate to the florida convention and i volunteered to go to vietnam as an intelligence analyst in the u.s. army.

under the current administration, the republican party has deserted its dedicated people who believed in fiscal responsibility, a balanced budget, truthfulness from its leaders, coordination and involvement of its nato and u.n. allies and national security that defends but does not violate the civil liberties of its citizens.

under bush jr. we have for the first time a "yes" president rather than a president who is surrounded by "yes" men. rather than an mba who delegates, he has relinquished the reins of governing to the puppeteer handlers who through the strings of control have told him of supposed weapons of mass destruction, the cost benefits of using halliburton, the safety of reckless deficit spending, the sensibility of privatizing social security and the wisdom of going-it-alone in the world.

this president has said "yes" and the mission has not been accomplished.

the nytimes is reporting that 380 tons of conventional explosives in iraq, which was obstensively the responsibility of the u.s., is missing. whoops!

the iraqi interim government has warned the united states and international nuclear inspectors that nearly 380 tons of powerful conventional explosives - used to demolish buildings, make missile warheads and detonate nuclear weapons - are missing from one of iraq's most sensitive former military installations.

the huge facility, called al qaqaa, was supposed to be under american military control but is now a no man's land, still picked over by looters as recently as sunday. united nations weapons inspectors had monitored the explosives for many years, but white house and pentagon officials acknowledge that the explosives vanished sometime after the american-led invasion last year.

the white house said president bush's national security adviser, condoleezza rice, was informed within the past month that the explosives were missing. it is unclear whether president bush was informed. american officials have never publicly announced the disappearance, but beginning last week they answered questions about it posed by the new york times and the cbs news program "60 minutes."

Sunday, October 24, 2004

experts tell us that most voters have had no difficulty making up their minds in this year's presidential election. half the nation is passionately for george w. bush, the pollsters say, and half passionately for john f. kerry -- or, at least, passionately against mr. bush. we have not been able to share in this passion, nor in the certainty. as readers of this page know, we find much to criticize in mr. bush's term but also more than a few things to admire. we find much to admire in mr. kerry's life of service, knowledge of the world and positions on a range of issues -- but also some things that give us pause. on balance, though, we believe mr. kerry, with his promise of resoluteness tempered by wisdom and open-mindedness, has staked a stronger claim on the nation's trust to lead for the next four years.

and, in a strange turn of events, republican editor steve chapman of the chitrib (you have to register) breaks with the newspaper and endorses john kerry:

at the age of 50, i get few chances to try something entirely new. come nov. 2, i plan to take one of those rare opportunities. i'm going to vote for a democrat for president.

i've never done it before, and i hope i never have to do it again. but president bush has made an irresistible case against his own re-election. his first term has been one of the most dismal and costly failures of any presidency. his second promises to be even worse.

plain dealing from the bottom of the deckreader bayard brewin forwards us this email from a friend of his:

dear all-

i learned this morning that tomorrow morning's edition of the cleveland plain dealer will endorse george bush for a second four-year term. what makes this particularly disgraceful and quite terrifying is that the seven-member editorial board of the pd voted 5-2 to endorse john kerry. the publisher overruled them and announced the paper would support bush. similarly, the lorain journal editors were told that either they endorse george bush or they endorse no one. so, they are endorsing no one.

it is critical for us to start a major letter writing campaign to the plain dealer and to spread the word about the publisher overruling the editorial board's vote. if this is going on here, you can imagine it's being duplicated all over the country.

letters can be mailed to the editor, the plain dealer, 1801 superior ave, cleveland 44114. email can be sent to letters@plaind.com. faxes can be sent to 216-999-6209.

for those of you who don't live in the cleveland area, know that in this critical swing state, the area covered by the pd is the most critical area for us to get out the kerry vote to swing the state.

digby at hullabaloo gives us a still photo from the new karl rove fright-fest "wolves" commercial now running (and athenae at first draft takes us to the possible inspiration for same; plus in the comment section, we are sent to wolf packs for truth, a pack of wolves that claim that awol "tricked us; he told us we were filming a greenpeace commercial").

michael berube discusses the latest executive order which reversed the american league pennant outcome.

oliver willis alerts us to laurence o'donnell's smack down of john o'neill.

tchris at talkleft tells the story of one reservist who, after completing his legally proscribed term with the army, refused to be sent back to iraq, and is suing to stay home (tchris also points out that repubbb poll watchers in ohio might have the reverse effect of suppressing the vote that they allegedly are aiming for).

max sawicky claims (and perhaps rightly so) that george steinbrenner is the problem with the ny yankees.

tidbits from the cookiethe kids at the daily cookie send us a couple of morsels...

this knight-ridder piece detailing reports from people who worked with awol during his tenure at p.u.l.l., the professional united leadership leaque:

"i was working full time for an inner-city poverty program known as project p.u.l.l.," bush said in his 1999 autobiography, "a charge to keep." "my friend john white ... asked me to come help him run the program. ... i was intrigued by john's offer. ... now i had a chance to help people."

but white's administrative assistant and others associated with p.u.l.l., speaking on the record for the first time, say bush was not helping to run the program and white had not asked bush to come aboard. instead, the associates said, white told them he agreed to take bush on as a favor to bush's father, who was honorary co-chairman of the program at the time, and bush was unpaid. they say white told them bush had gotten into some kind of trouble but white never gave them specifics.

"we didn't know what kind of trouble he'd been in, only that he'd done something that required him to put in the time," said althia turner, white's administrative assistant.

"john said he was doing a favor for george's father because an arrangement had to be made for the son to be there," said willie frazier, also a former player for the houston oilers and a p.u.l.l. summer volunteer in 1973.

fred maura, a close friend of white, refers to bush as "43," for 43rd president, and his father as "41," for the 41st president.

"john didn't say what kind of trouble 43 was in - just that he had done something and he (john) made a deal to take him in as a favor to 41 to get some funding," maura said.

"he didn't help run the program. i was in charge of him and i wouldn't say i helped run the program, either," said david anderson, a recreational director at p.u.l.l.

also, here's an indiana gazette story about students who were tricked into registering as repubbbs when they thought they were signing a petition to legalize marijuana.

let this be a lesson. never use anything you want legalized right before you sign a petition to legalize it.

help! we've fallen and we can't get up!judd legum of winning argument points out that awol cut funds for first responders, including fire fighters, homeland security and urban rescue. but he's making america safer!

a lot of nervenerve.com, usually a magazine devoted to, shall we say, the celebration of the senses, has a political issue, with such articles as "they call him kinky," "all the presidents' spawn," "the body politic," "girlie power," and "cock the vote."

graciousness flu out the congress windowwhile most of us aren't getting a flu shot this year, congress doesn't have to fret. a large number of lawmakers have stepped over the shivering bodies of old people waiting in line for hours at the local drug store to score themselves one of the rare flu vaccines available. and, luckily for them, sen. majority leader bill "more than one way to skin a cat" frist volunteered the use of his office for the senators to receive their shots. pittsburglive tells us:

the senators were following the advice of senate majority leader bill frist, a heart surgeon from tennessee, who urged colleagues sept. 29 to get a flu shot, said frist spokeswoman amy call.

the warning was issued around the time chiron corp. announced that some of its doses -- manufactured at its plant in liverpool, england -- appeared to be contaminated.

frist allowed his office to be used as a makeshift clinic for dispensing shots to senators on oct. 7. that was two days after federal officials announced there would be a severe shortage this year and urged healthy adults to forgo shots so that children, the chronically ill, pregnant women and people 65 and older could get vaccinated.

california-based chiron was to provide 50 million doses, or about half of the nation's supply of flu vaccines.

the capitol's supply -- some 2,000 doses that also are available to staff -- came as no surprise to some residents of bloomfield, n.j. the new york city suburb is where a lottery was set today to award 300 flu vaccine doses.

"they get everything that they want, and we're just the little peons that work for them," said kathy johnson, who has gotten a flu shot because she has asthma.

john kerry, john edwards, and awol himself have passed up the flu shot, but dick cheney got one.
we are of the opinion that it's a good idea for cheney, being a heart patient, to get a flu shot. but those other congressjerks, whose excuse is "but we shake a lot of hands," are just using their position to get something that the rest of us will have to scramble for.

if they're so worried about catching something when they shake hands, they'd better get some cholera shots, since they have their heads up their butts so much!

we bet it wasn't humble pieholden over at first draft tells us that two guys tried to hit ann coulter with pies last night at the university of az:

as coulter addressed a question about terrorism, she stopped mid-statement: "you take away the terrorism and liberals would hate…” at that coulter gasped as she looked to her left, and began backing away from the podium. two men ran by, on-stage, and each threw a pie a her. they were mobbed as they tried to exit the auditorium.

she's among the people in bernalillo and sandoval counties who say they have had trouble with early voting equipment. when they have tried to vote for a particular candidate, the touch-screen system has said they voted for somebody else.

it's a problem that can be fixed by the voters themselves— people can alter the selections on their ballots, up to the point when they indicate they are finished and officially cast the ballot.

for griffith, it took a lot of altering.

she went to valle del norte community center in albuquerque, planning to vote for john kerry. "i pushed his name, but a green check mark appeared before president bush's name," she said.

griffith erased the vote by touching the check mark at bush's name. that's how a voter can alter a touch-screen ballot.

she again tried to vote for kerry, but the screen again said she had voted for bush. the third time, the screen agreed that her vote should go to kerry.

she faced the same problem repeatedly as she filled out the rest of the ballot. on one item, "i had to vote five or six times," she said.

bernalillo county clerk mary herrera said she doesn't believe the touch-screen system has been making mistakes. it's the fault of voters, she said thursday…

in sandoval county, three rio rancho residents said they had a similar problem, with opposite results. they said a touch-screen machine switched their presidential votes from bush to kerry.

who: stopsinclair.org, a running for change political action committee campaign, leads both the online and grassroots charge against sinclair broadcasting group. joining forces with america coming together and democratic blogs, they are protesting sinclair’s actions and making their position known to president bush, sinclair and its advertisers.

what: stopsinclair.org supporters will protest sinclair’s revised attack ad format: a pow story: politics, pressure and the media, due to air friday evening, by delivering to the white house 150,000 signatures demanding the halt of the hour-long attack ad along with a check symbolizing the $9,900,000 illegal in-kind contribution sinclair is effectively making to the bush campaign.

why: despite altering the program’s format, sinclair broadcasting’s decision to air excerpts from stolen honor, an anti-kerry piece funded by conservative activists, during an hour-long so-called “news” segment entitled a pow story: politics, pressure and the media is a partisan exploitation of public airwaves. stopsinclair.org is calling attention to the fact that sinclair broadcasting is directly contributing $9,900,000 to the bush campaign by airing this anti-kerry advertisement.

if you can't make it to dc (our private jet is unfortunately grounded somewhere in our wildest dreams), atrios also has a list of sinclair affiliates around the country you could show up to.

meanwhile, meanbone's dkos diary directs us to boycottsbg.com, where a letter from a sinclair employee tells us the recent press release indicating sinclair was "backing down" from its original position was just so much white noise.

hold the pickles, hold the lettuce, filthy liars do upset usin a victory for the boycott sinclair broadcasting movement, burger king has announced it will pull its ads from the controversial program "john kerry killed my mother and wants to kill yours, too." reuters:

hamburger chain burger king said on wednesday that it would not run its commercials during a controversial program about u.s. presidential candidate john kerry to be aired by sinclair broadcast group.

sinclair on tuesday backed away from airing a documentary critical of kerry's vietnam war-era record, but said it would show portions of that film in a special program that discusses allegations he betrayed fellow veterans with his antiwar activities.

burger king's move suggests advertisers may not be assured the new program's format averts political controversy. democrats have branded plans to air the program as a blatant partisan attack less than two weeks before the nov. 2 ballot.

i have been, and will continue to be, a republican. but when we as a party send the wrong person to the white house, then it is our responsibility to send him home if our nation suffers as a result of his actions. i fall in the category of good conservative thinkers, like george f. will, for instance, who wrote: "this administration cannot be trusted to govern if it cannot be counted on to think and having thought, to have second thoughts."

i say, well done george will, or, even better, from the mouth of the numero uno of conservatives, william f. buckley jr.: "if i knew then what i know now about what kind of situation we would be in, i would have opposed the war."

former republican gov. william milliken of michigan endorsed democratic sen. john kerry for president on monday, saying president bush has pursued policies "pandering to the extreme right wing."

milliken, governor from 1969-82, accused the bush administration of rushing into the iraq war, pushing tax cuts that benefit the rich and blocking meaningful stem-cell research.

"i felt so strongly about the direction of this country that in the end, it wasn't a difficult decision to make," milliken said in an interview monday with traverse city record-eagle reporters and editors.

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